SDL plc, the leading provider of Global Information Management (GIM) solutions, today announced the release of SDL Automated Translation Solutions™ to help companies meet the multilingual communication requirements of global businesses.

Businesses are producing increasing volumes of content that need to be delivered to expanding global markets. Providing this information in the language of the customer is key to new sales, to repeat sales and to customer satisfaction and yet many organizations struggle to provide this, because the cost is too high or it takes too long to translate. With teams dispersed around the globe, internal communications also hit the language barrier.

SDL Automated Translation Solutions™ open up new communications opportunities between people who speak different languages. They enable instant translation of content in corporate websites, documents, instant chat and e-mail. Through tight integration with existing translation processes and the translation supply chain, they provide rapid and highly cost-effective solutions for both ‘gisted’ and high-quality translations.

SDL Automated Translation Solutions provide much greater flexibility to meet the different translation needs of global businesses than has previously been possible:

• Instant translation of internal and external communications using plug-ins for Microsoft® Office applications and chat

• Instant translation of web pages

• Integration of automated translation with translation memory (TM) in the industry-leading SDL Trados® translation productivity suite

• Integration of automated translation with TM in the industry-leading translation management application, SDL Translation Management System™ (SDL TMS™)

• Flexibility to use automated translation integrated with human post-editing skills to provide the high-quality translation service, SDL Knowledge-based Translation System® (SDL KbTS™)

• Integration of automated translation with many business applications through documented APIs

“Through our partnership with SDL and our use of their automated translation, we have been able to provide support to our global dealers at 40% lower costs with significantly faster turnaround times,” commented Joe Pstrak, Director, Product Support-Knowledge Management at CNH. “This improves our customer service, by providing our worldwide dealers with solutions to their technical issues every hour of every day of the year, while significantly reducing the workload on support centers. We will continue to look at more ways of using automated translation to improve our business communications.”

“The volume of multilingual content and the velocity with which it’s created is a major force reshaping content practices at global companies,” comments Leonor Ciarlone, lead analyst in Gilbane Group’s content globalization practice. “Gilbane’s own research indicates that machine translation is viewed as one of the top three most valuable technologies going forward. What’s required is an optimum blend of knowledge worker expertise and automated translation that can tackle volume and velocity challenges with efficiency and transparency. By providing direct integration with enterprise and translator desktops, offerings such as SDL Automated Translation Solutions can deliver real value to operational requirements for multilingual communications.”

SDL is continuing to invest in R&D and has recently added support for automated translation from English into Swedish, with plans to support Finnish and Danish by the end of 2008. In addition, SDL is partnering with a number of academic institutions to further improve the quality of automated translation.

“With the continued explosion of digital content, coupled with the increasing growth in global business, translating large volumes of content for local markets is a considerable challenge and often seen by companies as cost prohibitive,” said Mark Lancaster, CEO and Chairman of SDL. “If content is needed in your home market, it is also needed in your local markets. Research has shown that the first to the market, and the company who provides the best and most thorough support in those areas, is the one with the competitive edge in that market.

SDL Automated Translation Solutions, integrated as part of a Global Information Management solution, enable companies to get more content into global markets faster and more cost effectively. Companies such as Best Western, CNH, HP, Microsoft and Renault have all benefited from automated translation technology from SDL. With today’s announcement, SDL is enabling its customers to fully integrate automated translation into their existing Global Information Management infrastructure. Global organizations now have the opportunity to substantially improve internal and external communications.”

To find out more about SDL Automated Translation Solutions visit http://www.sdl.com/communicate